The Russian Foreign Ministry's spokesperson compared those who destroy monuments in Poland to the barbaric destruction of monuments by the Islamic State

Russia’s Foreign Ministry official spokesperson Maria Zakharova

MOSCOW, December 10. /TASS/. Poland’s attempts to renege on the debt of gratitude to Soviet soldiers are immoral and the fighters against monuments are acting like terrorists in the Middle East, Russia’s Foreign Ministry official spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

"Now officials and state bodies, first of all in Europe, condemn the barbaric destruction of monuments by the Islamic State. It seems to me that those who destroy monuments in Poland to a large extent act like the Middle East terrorists," Zakharova said.

Over the past two years, more than 50 cases involving attacks on monuments and memorial complexes have been registered in the country and no one has been punished. The attacks against monuments continue in Poland as the vandals feel this impunity, the diplomat said.

"All the monuments to Soviet soldiers in Poland were erected only because of the country’s liberation from Hitler’s occupation and without it the Polish state would not exist," she said.

The Polish side distorts facts and interprets the existing bilateral agreements in a way to meet its political interests, Zakharova said.

Moscow insists that Poland should abide by the 1994 Russian-Polish agreement on burial grounds and memorial places commemorating victims of wars and repression.

Russia stresses that the agreement is applicable to military cemeteries and separate monuments, a fact that Poland denies.